


Persephone

by peppermintquartz



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Co-Dependency, Dark Will Graham, M/M, Oral Sex, post-mizumono
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-24
Updated: 2014-05-24
Packaged: 2018-01-26 08:18:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1681316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peppermintquartz/pseuds/peppermintquartz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A year after he recovered from being nearly gutted, Will Graham arrived in Seville. For three days he was content to play the tourist, visiting the famed UNESCO World Heritage site of the cathedral and the palace complex.<br/>On the fourth day, he abandoned his luggage at Santa Justa train station, keeping only his money, his passport and an address.<br/>That same evening, he walked up a narrow flight of steps into the new office of Dr Hannibal Lecter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Persephone

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for Mizumono if you have not watched it.

A year after he recovered from being nearly gutted, Will Graham arrived in Seville. For three days he was content to play the tourist, visiting the famed UNESCO World Heritage site of the cathedral and the palace complex.

On the fourth day, he abandoned his luggage at Santa Justa train station, keeping only his money, his passport and an address.

That same evening, he walked up a narrow flight of steps into the new office of Dr Hannibal Lecter.

*****

Will found himself pausing before the door. The faint lamplight above the doorway would have given his presence away, not that he intended to surprise the doctor. Yet he did not know what to say.

_Best to grasp the nettle firmly._ He rapped on the door four times. Silence. That was as expected. Will opened it but did not enter.

"You found me," said Hannibal. He was at his desk and did not look up from his work. Will could hear a pencil scratching away on paper - possibly parchment, one could never tell with the doctor - and waited. Hannibal put his pencil down. "Come in."

"Thank you," said Will. He shrugged off his coat and folded it in his arms.  "I... I'd thought you'd leave again."

"As I did in Nice, in Prague, in Florence, in Hangzhou?" Hannibal smiled thinly, his fingers lacing together. "I have respect for such perseverance, if not such mulishness. Then again, in those places you rushed straight to my offices without taking time to appreciate the views."

"This time I did," Will said.

Hannibal Lecter looked much the same as he did: his suit was a somber gray-and-blue, his shirt a dove gray and his tie a deep sapphire. Very elegant, if not as flamboyant. He regarded Will coolly for a few heartbeats, before saying, "Please. Have a seat."

"Thank you."

"So courteous now, when once you were brash and forward," the doctor observed.

"That was a lifetime ago." Will smiled faintly. "I've changed."

"Have you?" 

A world of meaning in so few words. Hannibal Lecter did not leave his desk even as Will Graham sat down in a comfortable armchair, so like the one back in Baltimore. Will peered around at the office, taking in the understated opulence of the space. It was half as large as the one Hannibal used in his sessions with Will, but he retained the same dark woods and luxurious fabrics. Books lined the shelves and a metronome sat between a Buddha statuette and a dancing Shiva figurine in silver on the mantelpiece. Behind it was a framed painting of a dark-haired woman, dressed in blue silks, and in her hand she clutched an open pomegranate.

_"Proserpine,_ " Hannibal supplied when Will looked at him once again. "A replica of a Rosetti painting."

"That would be the other name for Persephone," Will said. 

"Yes." The doctor leaned back in his chair, his gaze inscrutable. "Why are you here, Will? You have seen me for who I am, and I have seen you for what you are."

"For what I was, Dr Lecter," said Will quietly. "I have... changed."

"So you claim." Hannibal's tone was mocking, but despite the older man's control, Will could hear the undercurrent of hurt deep within it. "Why should your change concern me?"

Will placed his folded coat on the floor next to his feet, and then took off his watch and glasses, setting them down on the side table with careless reverence. "Alana died after three hours in surgery," he said. "Abigail... I felt her life seep through my fingers. And Jack lost everything: his wife, his career, his reputation. He is a shell of a man now." Will Graham paused. "But you know all that."

Hannibal did not respond.

The younger man smiled, his face long unused to such an exercise. "Do you recall what you and I shared about our imaginations? You have your mind palace and I - I have my stream."

"You are no longer able to just wade in and let everything wash past you?"

"It feels like wading in blood now," Will confessed, as though this was merely another therapy session, as though everything that had happened had not happened yet.

The doctor rose from his desk. He still moved silently, Will noted, and corrected that to  _prowled._ Hannibal stood five paces in front of Will. "What do you want, Will?"

"That night, when you didn't run. You broke us but you didn't kill us outright," said Will, dragging his gaze from Hannibal's feet up to the doctor's face. "And you said you forgave me. Why?"

"The reason to which statement?"

"Either. Both."

Hannibal pressed his lips together and his gaze darkened. It was a long time before he said reluctantly, "Because you changed me."

"Does your forgiveness still stand? Am I still forgiven?"

"Yes."

"Dr Lecter," said Will, standing up slowly, "Hannibal."

The two men regarded each other warily. It had been too long since the name passed Will's lips, too long since Hannibal heard his own name from a familiar face; a lifetime or two ago. No one in Seville called him that. In Seville, he was Dr Fell.

"Hannibal," he tried again, "do you love me?"

The doctor did not answer, but the silence and the look in his eyes told Will everything he needed to know. Will Graham took a deep breath and whispered, "I wish I had known. I'm sorry I lost your trust."

"The cup remains shattered. An apology does not return it to its original state."

"I came to redeem myself in your eyes."

"I find that difficult to believe."

"I gave away the dogs," Will said in a non sequitur. "I have nothing left in the world beyond what you see. My money and my passport are in my coat. No one know I'm here." He took one step forward and relaxed. "If you kill me now, no one will ever know."

"Very brave of you." That mocking tone was back.

Will tilted his head. "There's not an ounce of bravery in that decision. I am tired, Hannibal. I'm tired of being alone. Of being... lost."

Hannibal narrowed his eyes, and to Will's surprise, returned to his desk. "Please leave now."

Dramatic measures had to be taken then. Will sighed. He had hoped that would not be necessary. With deft movements he unbuttoned his plain cotton shirt and slipped out of it, folding it with care and placing it on the chair he vacated. He could feel Hannibal's eyes on him, and when he turned around, the doctor was staring at the long horizontal gash across his naked abdomen.

Feeling rather like a specimen under a microscope, Will Graham nevertheless forged on. His thin leather belt was removed quickly, his shoes toed off and his socks tucked inside them. Finally, with a mild surge of apprehension, he unzipped his jeans and stepped out of them, folding them on top of his shirt.

When he turned around to face Hannibal again, he knew he was starting to blush and forced down the embarrassment. "As you can see, doctor, I have no weapon and I am not wired. I am here of my own accord. Not the FBI's."

"Not for Alana? Not for Abigail?"

"I can do nothing for them now," said Will, resignation creeping into his voice. "I came looking for you to redeem my value in your eyes. I don't know what value that would be; I could be a person, or I could be your supper."

Hannibal's calm facade cracked for an instant, and Will almost reeled from that split-second glimpse of that real Hannibal Lecter waiting behind the human mask. 

"I would be lying if I said I have not dreamed of this," said the older man, his accent more pronounced now. "I have wanted you bared to me, willingly. Open. Vulnerable. But there were always obstacles."

"Alana is dead, and Jack and I want nothing to do with each other."

"Not them. I would have gotten rid of them eventually," said Hannibal. "You have a strong moral code. You wear it like armor."

Will wanted to laugh. "That armor no longer exists."

"You are a moral person," said Hannibal, almost smiling. "Take that away, and you are no longer Will Graham. I wanted to believe I could take it from you, but that had been prideful of me."

"Fuck morality." Will strode around the desk and grabbed Hannibal up by his lapels, knowing full well that he had placed himself in the jaws of a lion. "I have no one left, Hannibal. No one and nothing. No one in the world besides you knows who I am, what I am. What I have been, what I can be. I - I am losing myself. I. Am. Drowning. In my head.  _I need you._ "

Hannibal grasped Will's wrists and abruptly slammed him into the wall behind the younger man, driving the breath out of Will's body. His breath was hot as he whispered into Will's ear, "That was vulgar, and very rude."

Will's grin was savage. "Then _eat_ me."

Hannibal chuckled and nuzzled under Will's jaw, pushing his arms up to stretch high above his head. The older man nosed along Will's neck, his tongue sliding down the bared column. Will's pulse picked up when he felt the scrape of Hannibal's teeth over his carotid artery. The doctor bit down lightly, drawing a long, broken moan from Will's throat.

"I will not eat you," Hannibal breathed into Will's ear. "This is your perfect form, Will Graham. The pure balance of dominance and submission. I will not mar this exquisite design, not after you have  _changed_."

Then the older man let go and stepped back. Will lowered his arms, aware that he had a burgeoning arousal and that Hannibal was aware of it too. 

Hannibal relaxed and leaned against his desk. "You have had my love since the day you looked into my eyes," he confided tenderly. "You have had my forgiveness when you phoned to warn me that they knew. But you do not have my trust. I will not give you that again."

"What can I do to earn it?" Will asked. 

"Sins of omission - that I can forgive and forget. You were serving two masters, after all. But you lied to me, after we both promised to tell the truth. That... That is unforgivable."

*****

"I'm surprised you called," said Freddie Lounds. Her hair was still as garishly red as ever, her curls luxuriant, but these days she wore clothes that were worth Will's car and carried bags that could pay the rent for a few households. It was decidedly odd to place her overt wealth in Will's house.

"Thank you for coming." Will made himself smile. "You've done well for yourself."

"You're the reason behind it all," the woman said breezily. Her tone softened. "I'm sorry about Alana and Jack."

"No you're not."

"I am," said Freddie. "A little." She looked around. "Where are your dogs?"

"I was... in a bad way. The FBI had them adopted by other families. It's better for them." Will's heart ached; he missed their bright eyes and eager demeanor. "I asked you not to write about Abigail."

The woman looked contrite. "I had to, she was found in the house with you covering her wound. The significance-"

"-you promised, Freddie," Will cut her off. "Just me and Hannibal."

"I gave her a pseudonym."

Will Graham fiddled with his glasses. "Pseudonyms are pointless. She is in the story now."

The redhead sighed. "How are you, Will? I know the FBI dropped you. I could help you write a book, secure your future finances.  _Therapy with a Serial Killer_. It'll sell millions."

"I don't need that kind of money. I need... I need someone to talk to, someone who understands me."

"I'm sure you can find a friend who's not dead or bitter," said Freddie, somewhat sympathetically. She dug into her bag and pulled out a hardcover of her book. "Signed and hardcover. I know you don't want it, but put it on eBay and I'm sure someone will bite."

"I suppose."

"You shouldn't live alone, you know," Freddie said with a sigh. "Mind like yours... It'll turn against itself, rip it to bits. Do you need help finding a new psychiatrist?"

Will shook his head. "I have found one." His gaze slid up to a point above and behind her. "He understands everything about me."

Freddie was suddenly very nervous.

Then she was not anymore.

*****

"This time I will watch you."

"Teach me how."

*****

Will let his hands be guided to the headboard and smiled when Hannibal looped his forest green paisley tie around Will's wrists. He liked that tie. Then Hannibal ran his skillful hands along Will's arms and under his shoulders, along his ribs, down his hips and legs and feet. The older man was still dressed, albeit without his tie, and his hair was mussed from all the kissing earlier after their dinner. Given the rudimentary state of Will's kitchen, the meal had been plain by Hannibal's standards: braised chops, with sides of roasted vegetables and topped with wild mushrooms.

"I like you like this," said Hannibal. His eyes gleamed dark red. "It reminds me of... surrender."

"Yes," breathed Will.

"I said I will not eat you. I think, however, that I should taste you." Hannibal straddled Will's hips and ran his thumb over the scar at the belly. "How long did it take to recover?"

"Months."

"Mm." Hannibal pressed his mouth over Will's, his tongue pushing into the younger man's, and drawing Will's into his own, sucking gently on the muscle.

Will found his heart racing; Hannibal could bite his tongue off and let him choke to death on his own blood, perhaps. The doctor didn't, though he nipped Will's lower lip until it bled, and then pressed the flat of his tongue there to collect the blood.

"You taste exactly how I imagined you to taste," he said with a note of quiet wonder. "Clean and fresh, with a bite of acid."

"How do you taste?" Will asked impetuously.

Hannibal smiled and shifted up the bed, his long legs framing Will's shoulders. He undid his belt, and then the fly of his pants, drawing out his cock. "Here you go."

It was not easy, but Hannibal was doing most of the work, sliding his cock in and out of Will's mouth. The younger man swirled his tongue over the thick head, and remembered to relax his throat; it was not easy without his hands to help guide Hannibal's motion. 

"I could kill you like this," said Hannibal in a matter-of-fact voice. "Force you to choke on my erection."

Will hummed in agreement, his own cock twitching, and closed his eyes, focusing on the texture and smell and taste of the older man sliding rhythmically in and out of his mouth, reminding himself to breathe, to suck and to relax his throat.

Suddenly Hannibal picked up the pace, one strong hand curling under Will's neck, weaving fingers into Will's curls. Will could hardly breathe as Hannibal bore down, the tip of his cock prodding the back of Will's throat every time, making him gag. His throat closed up and he wanted to cough, but he couldn't. instinctively he opened his eyes and stared up. He could barely see Hannibal's shadowed face, barely hear the doctor's grunts. He could only feel the heat radiating from Hannibal's skin, feel the heat in his own face, feel the heat spurting into his mouth and swallow it down.

A moment later, the older man slipped out of Will's mouth but did not move from where he had straddled over Will's chest. Hannibal was peering down, heedless of his disheveled, savage beauty. 

"If you sit on my chest and cover my mouth," said Will, knowing his voice was hoarse from the abuse it just took, "I will suffocate. There won't be a mark at all."

"I have taken my pleasure," said Hannibal, "and it would be rude to deny you of yours through simple asphyxiation."

Hannibal kissed and nibbled down Will's body, spending inordinate amounts of time on the younger man's nipples and throat. Will's mind screamed at him every time Hannibal sucked on his neck:  _he could bite he could rip he could tear he could kill_ , and with every thought Will shuddered and grew more aroused.

The older man seemed to know exactly what he was thinking. When his mouth had drawn level with Will's erection, he flashed a dangerous grin at Will, and deliberately tested his teeth against the tip of the leaking cock. Will almost came right at that moment, but Hannibal slowed his actions and murmured a soothing phrase into Will's hip.

After that, Hannibal stopped teasing and focused on  _taking_. Will Graham slowly fell apart under Hannibal's expert hands and mouth. His arms strained against the bonds as Hannibal licked and sucked on his cock, never quite using enough pressure or speed to push Will over the edge as he insinuated a finger into Will's body. In the thick, suffocating silence, Will's whines and moans dripped like thick honey over them. Hannibal's tongue explored his prize thoroughly, trailing down from the head of Will's erection down the silky, hard shaft, past heavy testicles and further down into Will himself. The younger man cried out in supplication as Hannibal stabbed his tongue into him, breathing him in, his large hands kneading into Will's shaking thighs.

"Please, Hannibal, more, please, please, more, I need- I need you, more-" The words were tumbling past his lips without thought; Will knew his eyes were open, he could see the darkness over him, the black antlers and thorns crowding over the bed, shrouding their coupling; he could feel soulless eyes staring from the corners of the room but they would not dare to approach the bed, not with Hannibal here with him; he could hear the accusing voices of Alana Bloom and Abigail Hobbs finally fading into whispers, and as Hannibal closed his mouth over Will's cock and sucked and drank him in, the whispers faded out to a hush and all he could hear was his heartbeat racing faster faster  _faster-_

_"God!"_

"I have you, Will," came the gentle whisper.

The darkness had never been so _quiet._ Will trembled and let the tears finally fall.

*****

 The new head of Behavioral Sciences, James Douglas, came to Jack Crawford after the fifth reported murder. 

"Lecter's back," said Douglas. "But not in Baltimore. He's killing across the country, Jack, and no one knows his pattern more than you."

Jack looked at the photos laid out across his dining table. Some were Hannibal Lecter's works, he could recognize the signature theatrics now, as though he had finally learned how to see with Will Graham's eyes. But the others were different. Less theatrical display, more...

"Sensitive," he murmured to himself, touching the photograph under the entire stack. The first murder. "There is less poetry and more... honesty."

"Freddie Lounds. Tabloid reporter turned multimillionaire author." Douglas wrinkled his nose. "Peeled off her face and laid it at her feet, along with her tongue."

"They're telling us she was a two-faced liar," said Jack. "Now we see her mask and her real face beneath it - the one crawling with maggots."

"They? I thought you said Lecter worked alone."

Jack looked at each gruesome display and realized with a growing sense of nausea what had transpired. "No. He's found someone who understands him."

"Do you know who that might be?"

"No." Jack pushed the photos back to Douglas and stood up, a clear indication for the special agent to leave. "I advise you to give up before you get too close."

"Give up? Jack, with each kill Hannibal becomes more visible-"

"They will disappear very soon," said Jack wearily. "You will be chasing nothing but echoes of the nightmares they leave behind. Give up on snaring them, and find easier targets. Don't follow my example. Now get out of my home and leave me in peace."

_Not that I have much of it left,_ he thought, and wondered how long he would have before he saw Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham in his kitchen, waiting for dinner.


End file.
